Courtship, Weddings, and Marriage in Mexican American Culture

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Courtship, Weddings, and Marriage in Mexican
American Culture

• Katie Van Loo
• AL 890

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Courtship

• Attitudes toward dating vary
• Traditional courtship vs. Americanized
  courtship
• Interaction between unmarried couples
• Portadores
• Elopement

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Wedding traditions

• Funding a wedding
• Combination of Mexican and American traditions
• Padrinos (godparents)
• The padrino system
• Generally come inpairs (couples)
• What padrinos do
• Kneeling pillows (cojines)
• Lazo

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Lazo

• What is a lazo?
• The significanceof the lazo

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More wedding traditions

• Reception
• Food and location depend on the couples budget
• Mariachis
• strolling band of musicians

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La Boda (The Wedding)

• Documentary follows Elizabeththe week before her
  wedding
• She is a migrant worker who liveshalf the year
  in Mission, Texas(in the Rio Grande River
  Valley)and half the year in California
• Her wedding to Artemio takesplace in Los
  Ramones, NuevoLeon, Mexico, right acrossthe
  border from Texas

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Marriage

• Traditional versus companionate marriage
• Machismo
• Changing gender roles
• Divorce/desertionrates
• High levels ofdissatisfaction
• Possibly caused byAmericanization

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A Combination of Cultures

• Effects of combining Mexican and American
  traditions
• Although commonly depicted as an
  undifferentiated rural population given to a
  traditional way of life, Mexican-Americansare
  a diverse and heterogeneous population
  characterized by important internal
  differences.
• (from Variations in Mexican-American Family
  Life A Review Synthesis by Michael V. Miller,
  1975)

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Thank you!